2009 Honda Civic 4DR Hybrid

We've said in the past the best thing about the Honda Civic Hybrid is that it's a Civic, and that's still true. The best thing about hybrids, of course, is that they don't require any changes to the current infrastructure. We don't have to have different fuel tanks, or put electric charging facilities in new or existing fueling stations. We just stop and pump in ten or 12 gallons of 87 octane unleaded and we're good to go.

And that is one HUGE advantage hybrid cars and trucks have over nearly all of the other "alternative" energy sources. Hydrogen requires specialized storage, at least, until someone comes up with a viable (including cost-effective) way to convert water carried in tanks on the car or truck into hydrogen as needed.

Solar? You have to be kidding. Our best use of solar for cars at this time might well be to use it to power some of the onboard gadgets or even to power the air conditioning compressor. Mazda used some small solar panels to power a fan to keep the interior cool when the car was parked that could also be used to charge the battery. It was both a gimmick and a chance to work with solar technology and make enough solar panels to lower their cost.

Take the Civic Hybrid. One feature is an "Auto Stop" control that turns off the engine while you are stopped at a stop sign or traffic light, and then turns it back on when you release the brake. It's a trick several new cars use, and they keep things like the power steering and air conditioning running by powering them electrically instead of using engine power to do it.

Until now, everything on the car was run, directly or indirectly, by engine power. The battery is a storage battery, used to re-start the car after you've turned the engine off. Once it does that, it normally charges itself back up (which takes a few seconds) and then waits for the next time you need to start the car or until some other electrical malfunction disables the charging system (alternator). If the normal charging is interrupted, the battery will run the electrical systems until it goes dead.

Which means you are using engine power to run the radio, the power steering system, the air conditioner and so on. The battery isn't doing anything most of the time. But it could. Small solar panels can continually charge the battery and the power used to run all the added electrical gadgets (and we do love our gadgets).

How important that might be depends on the future cost of fossil fuels and how fast alternatives can be developed. Right now, automakers are using combinations of other fuel sources or means of saving fuel to make fairly large gains in fuel economy. But the technology to do it isn't cheap.

Honda's Civic costs around three to five thousand dollars less than the Honda Civic Hybrid, and the hybrid version does get better fuel economy. We made our usual run down to South Texas and recorded a solid 42 miles per gallon overall, running at 70 miles per hour, reasonably close to the 45 mpg the EPA expects from the Civic Hybrid. In the city if was closer to 35 mpg, which is still pretty respectable.

Our test Civic was equipped with just about everything, including a navigational system and leather seats, plus a satellite radio. It used a Continuously Variable Transmission (CVT) and had all the usual power everything, making one wonder why they don't sell even more of them, as it has everything you need.

Of course, you could buy the lower priced non-hybrid Civic and get all that for much less, but you wouldn't be quite as kind to the environment; it just depends on your priorities. With the Civic, you get hybrid in a proven car, with the only drawback a bit stiffer ride, even though the Civic Hybrid weighs only about 80 pounds more than the standard version.

We also wonder what changes in battery technology might bring before the battery pack needs changing. Perhaps we'll see a much more efficient battery pack, even a more efficient electric motor so the Civic could run longer and faster on the batteries alone.

In the meantime, the Civic Hybrid has the edge it has always had, now in a more up-to-date package: it's a Honda, and it's a Civic.

Source;
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